Study underscores hunger problems facing Haiti

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - A new study says that Haitians have suffered widespread hunger following an unusually active storm season this year and are likely to experience more.

The findings show that rural homes in Haiti's west, north and Grand-Anse departments experienced "severe food shortages" after Hurricane Sandy and a less powerful unnamed storm that followed. The two brushed Haiti in October and November.

The study also finds that people in almost 70 percent of households interviewed said they experienced moderate or severe hunger.

The report echoes United Nations warnings that more than 1.5 million people in Haiti are at risk of malnutrition because of crops lost in the storms. Up to 90 percent of Haiti's harvest season was destroyed in Sandy's floods.